This blog is aimed mainly at advanced students of English as a foreign / second language, although it will hopefully also be of some interest to teachers. I intend it to be a mishmash of lessons, exercises and the occasional opinionated rant about the English language.

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Sunday, May 15, 2011

Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary has (AmE) / have (BrE) put together their favourite (BrE) / favorite (AmE) ten British words, and I thought they might be worth a little exercise.

Merriam-Webster are (BrE) / is (AmE) one of the best-known American publishers of dictionaries, and direct heir(s) of Noah Webster, whose An American Dictionary of the English Language was first published in 1828. It was Noah Webster who established the American system of spelling.

I have to admit I didn't realise they were all British. And one of them, chunter, was completely new to me.

Have a look at their definitions here first, then do the exercise. I've also added some of my own (not necessarily British); mouse over the words in blue for their definitions.

Exercise 1 - The Merriam-Webster Top Ten. Fill the gaps with the words in the box. ?

Click and Drop - Wherever you see this symbol ?, place the cursor over it for instructions, using your mouse.

Answers - At the bottom of the post you will find a row of answer buttons. Click on the appropriate button and return to the exercise.

Print friendly - Each post is designed to be printable. Exercises usually appear on separate pages, or grouped together on a page. You can make a teacher copy with answers by clicking on 'Show All', then printing. Make sure you 'Clear All' before printing student copies. I strongly recommend doing a Print Preview first. You might want to change your margins and you certainly won't want to print every page.

Update - On newer posts, many of the exercises are individually printable. Just click on the print button, and they will appear in a new, easily printable page.

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About Me

Hi. I'm a common-or-garden TEFL teacher living and working in Poland. My background is British, Scottish to be precise.
I am definitely neither a linguist nor an expert on grammar, simply someone with a healthy interest in my language and its development.